Journalist Dmytro Khyliuk, recently freed as part of a prisoner swap, said in a comment to reporters that Russia’s prisoners live in a total information vacuum, Stas Kozliuk reports for the Institute of Mass Information.
“No one receives any letters. A complete information vacuum, absolutely complete. And my greatest concern, of course, was not for myself, but to find my parents alive. Fortunately, they live, and I have spoken to them. I know that everything is fine and that burden is off my shoulders,” said Dmytro.
When asked if he had heard about the liberation of Kherson, he said no, adding that he was not even aware what time it was.
“It’s a total lack of any information, let alone about Kherson. We didn’t even know what time it was. The first time I saw a clock in three and a half years was on a bus in Belarus, as they were taking us from the airport to the Ukrainian border. The only things we could see there (in the Russian prison, — Ed.) were the painted-over windows of the cell, a sliver of sky from the window that was open for ventilation; we only see the asphalt because we only walk bent down. We never see the green grass, literally, we don’t see birds, the only thing we’ve been seeing over the years is crows on the observation towers,” the journalist said.
Khyliuk says that they kept a calendar in their cell to navigate the dates: “We memorize today’s date, tomorrow’s date, we remember the birthdays of loved ones and our own in the cells. It’s very scary, it’s not just an information vacuum, but a vacuum of everything.”
Dmytro added that he planned to resume his work as a journalist.
As IMI reported, UNIAN journalist Dmytro Khyliuk, who had been kidnapped by Russian forces in Kyiv oblast in March 2022, was released on August 24, 2025.